He never hit me, yet he hurt me every day.
“I lied and said I was busy. I was busy; but not in a way most people understand. I was busy taking deeper breaths. I was busy silencing irrational thoughts. I was busy calming a racing heart. I was busy telling myself I’m okay. Sometimes this is my busy and I will not apologise for it.”
B Oakman
Let’s be honest we’ve all been there. We thought we’d met someone warm, caring and understanding. Someone we could see a future with, but slowly started seeing flashes of behaviour that didn’t quite fit with the person we thought they were. So, we brushed it off, thinking we were imagining it. Before we knew it, we were celebrating our one-year anniversary and the many after that. Yes, we’re still together but those flashes have now become a way of life.
Congratulations you’re officially in a toxic relationship, and like most cases of abuse, your abuser is someone you know well. They’re the person who you thought you fell hopelessly in love with. But it’s really not something worth celebrating. Relationships aren’t easy at the best of times, but toxic relationships they’re a whole new level of difficult – a rollercoaster of emotions. Toxic relationships always start off so beautifully. You’re showered with so much love and attention, you almost can’t believe your luck.
What we don’t realise is our abuser is banking on this. They don’t want you to see the warning signs for what they are – big fat red flags, telling you to pack your bags and run faster than you’ve ever run in your life. Yet for some inexplicable reason, you’re still there, glued to the same spot, standing next to the person you love, yet feeling more alone than you ever knew you could.
Why? Because when you’re in a toxic relationship and you can never see it for what it really is. You believe you’re in a healthy relationship and you just don’t see you’re being abused. It’s not like you’re being beaten or anything so how can it be abuse?
That’s the difficult thing about emotional abuse, it’s invisible. There’s no hard evidence of what’s happening, so you don’t believe things are as bad as they are. But you are not imagining the abuse, your abuser is just that, someone who is victimising you. The pattern is always the same, they do whatever they can to break you, then they pretend to fix you, all the while making you feel emotionally dependent on the toxicity they’ve disguised as love. It can become strangely addictive.
You’d think recognising you’re in a toxic relationship would be easy, but we make it difficult for ourselves because we can’t admit it. Most people can’t accept they’re being abused as it somehow makes them feel weak. But let me be frank. Being with an emotional abuser does not make you weak, foolish maybe, but not weak. It takes a lot of strength to wake up every day and live with a partner like this.
Your friends and family will never be able to understand why you stay with a partner that is so obviously narcissistic and controlling. They can tell you til they’re blue in the face, but until you see the warning signs yourself, you’ll never have the strength to walk away. Rest assured though, it might take 10 years, but you will have your ‘straw that broke the camel’s back’ epiphany and once that happens, you will walk away
A few things I recognised from the times I realised I was in a toxic relationship, and I have been guilty of having a fair few.
You’re not yourself.
When I met him, I was this bubbly, confident, happy go lucky woman, which made me pretty popular with the boys. But slowly but surely, he knocked my confidence so much that I stopped being me. It wasn’t until I bumped into an old friend and he asked me outright ‘what happened? Where did the fierce Suki go? Do you remember when we first met? I couldn’t help but notice you, you had this come and get me if you can attitude, but now all I see is this woman that doesn’t want to be noticed’. Sometimes it takes someone else to point out what our heart already knows.
He tries to change you.
Remember that gorgeous, confident girl all his mates fancied? The one he just had to get to know, no? Me neither. When you’re with an emotional abuser the things they loved about you are the things they try and change about you. The man that once loved how I dressed; or how jealous his friends were that he was with me, became the man that wanted to shield me from the rest of the world. He was the same man that didn’t want me to wear clothes that hugged my body as tight, and he certainly didn’t want me to stay friends with my male friends.
You walk around on eggshells.
Every day was a chance for a new argument and I got tired of the constant fighting. So instead, I turned into a woman who didn’t really have much to say and just kept her mouth shut (yes i know that’s hard for you to believe). It’s tiring tip toeing around someone, especially when everything you say fuels yet another argument. I learnt this lesson the hard way. An abuser is born pissed off. It doesn’t matter what you say or do, they’ll always find something to be pissed off about, even the way you say hello 🙂 .
He’s the one in control.
Looking back; I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner. He decided what we did and when we did it. When we went out, he would always walk in first, while he wanted me to diligently follow him, like some lapdog. Yes, he asked me what I wanted but ultimately it was his decision. In the beginning I loved how he just took control. Now there’s a man that knows what he wants i thought, he knows how to treat a woman but now I see it for what it really was – a desire to control me. This man will try every trick in the book until he finds your sweet spot and then the power is firmly in his court.
You can’t do anything without him.
One minute I had a great group of friends, was out every night, living my best life. The next I was staying in every night, just the two of us. I didn’t do anything without him. My life had become insular. At first, I loved spending all this time with him, our world became just the two of us, this bubble that no one could penetrate, then it stifled me. I had already stopped seeing my friends as regularly, I distanced myself from all my male friends (his paranoia was convinced they all wanted to jump into bed with me). Sound familiar? Then ask yourself when was the last time you had fun without him and broke free from the shackles?
Your decisions are based around pleasing him.
Relationships are all about give and take, but when one person is always taking you know there is something wrong. Every decision I made was about pleasing him and winning his approval. when did I become this person? I am not this weak, and I don’t let people walk over me, but here I was letting him do just that to me. It reminded me of being a child and wanting my parents’ approval. The only difference was I’d now switched my parents’ approval for my partners.
You’ll always be in the wrong.
When you are dealing with an abuser you soon realise no matter what you say, you’ll always be the one in the wrong. I remember once walking down the street with my then partner, minding my own business. All I heard was ‘I saw that’ ‘saw what?’ ‘I saw the way he looked at you’ I had no idea what or who he was talking about, but it was my fault that some man walking down the street smiled at me. I’m sorry I didn’t realise it was a crime for people to smile at you!
He projects his insecurities onto you.
Yes, he still tells you that you look pretty when you dress up for him, but God forbid you get dressed up to go out without him, then he’s questioning why you’re so dressed up and who you’re really going out with. He’s insecure so instead of admitting his vulnerabilities he’d rather knock you down a peg or two. In the end you just think, I’ll cancel my plans, it’s much easier to stay at home and voila just like that, your abuser gets what he wanted.
He is always keeping score.
Abusers are really good at holding grudges and keeping score. They think they’re smarter than you, so can outwit you every time. They’ll constantly remind you of all the things they do for you, but they conveniently forget every little thing you do for them, why? Because you choose not to shout it from the rooftop, and you are not keeping score. Maybe it’s time you started. The next time he’s having a snooze on that sofa, while you’re running around after him give him a not so gentle nudge, oops sorry did I just wake you?
Your loved ones do everything to avoid being around him.
When you met him, you chose to be with him. You got on the emotional rollercoaster without a care in the world, but your friends and family, weren’t given a choice, they’re innocent passengers. They didn’t buy a ticket to witness the daily emotional traumas, yet this is what happens. You think they’re being unreasonable but what you don’t see is everyone feels the same, you’re backing the wrong horse. All they want to do is shake you in the hope that you will come to your senses and see this person for what they truly are – an abuser.
If you are sitting here reading this with pity, don’t. If you are in a toxic relationship, I know despite what you’ve read you still won’t think this is you. People in abusive relationships have an endless ability to justify their abuser’s behaviour, while still not seeing it as abuse. I mean abuse is only physical right? Wrong. Emotional abuse is real and its far more destructive than physical abuse, others may not be able to see the scars, but it still takes years to heal.
What will it take? When will you start listening to your heart? Are you waiting for him to hit you? Will that finally make you see the relationship for what it is… toxic and the abuse as real? Will you finally understand it’s time to leave? I hope for your sake it never comes to this and you have the strength to walk away much sooner.
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